[Jonathan Rapping (John Marshall Law School in Atlanta) posted the following message on the CrimProf listserv today, and I am republishing excerpts here with his permission.]

Prior to teaching law school I was a public defender for twelve years. I spent nine years with the Public Defender Service in DC and served as its Training Director. I left PDS to become the Training Director for Georgia's then-new state-wide public defender system. After two years in Georgia I went to New Orleans to help with the efforts to build a PD office there in the wake of Katrina. I have since founded, and run, a non-profit called the Southern Public Defender Training Center (SPDTC). The mission of the SPDTC is to spearhead a cultural transformation in indigent defense in the South through the recruitment, training, and mentoring of a new generation of public defenders.

We are a small, but growing, organization and as part of our outreach campaign we put out a semi-annual e-newsletter. I know many of you are interested in, and involved with, indigent defense reform. If any of you would like to be included in our e-mailing please let me know off-line at jrapping@bellsouth.net. Include the e-mail address you would like us to include for you. If any of you would like more information on this effort please visit our website at www.southerndefender.com. On the "About" page you will find much downloadable information including a couple of articles I have written on the importance of cultural transformation to the larger indigent defense reform effort and why the model underlying the SPDTC (recruitment, training, and mentoring new PDs) is the most effective way to effect cultural transformation.